Lessons for immigration in Robert G. Kaiser’s ‘Act of Congress’

The Senate’s floor debate on immigration reform is testing its ability to reach agreement in an era of bitterly divided government.

Robert G. Kaiser’s new book, “Act of Congress: How America’s Essential Institution Works, and How it Doesn’t,” pulls back the curtain on just such a moment, the writing of the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill. It’s a story now old enough to be instructive and still young enough to account for the forces that shape our modern-day legislature.

In fact, many of them are downright ignorant about the complex mega-bills they deal with. Kaiser pulls no punches on lawmakers he sees as unwilling or unable to get educated on the legislation that would become Dodd-Frank, or on those who struggled to communicate about it. Several forces shape this reality.

“[In] a media age when members are expected to answer questions about any topic in the news, specialization can be risky,” Kaiser writes. Committee work takes up time. So does fundraising, a year-round chore. Gerrymandered districts lead to “safe-seat slackers.” And rank-and-filers without pet causes are often “happy to leave the details” to others.

“So Congress is dominated by people with political skills but limited expertise,” Kaiser writes. “Of the 535 members of [the] House and Senate, those who have a sophisticated understanding of the financial markets and their regulation could probably fit on the twenty-five-man roster of a Major League Baseball team.”

On the House Financial Services Committee, for example, Kaiser writes that:

— Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) “was vain, sometimes aggressive and not particularly bright.” (“By any fair or objective measure, Congresswoman Maloney is one of the hardest working and effective members of the House,” spokesman Jon Houston responded via email.)

— Rep. Randy Neugebauer of Texas was “not the brightest Republican member of the committee.” (Kaiser “confused a disagreement on the issues with a lack of understanding,” spokeswoman Heather Vaughan responded by email. “Congressman Neugebauer is in fact a respected expert on Dodd-Frank.”)

— And Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-Ala.) had “an unfortunate inclination to sound dumb in public,” although he “was actually an intelligent man” who did his homework. (Spokesman Tim Johnson declined to comment but noted Bachus’s legislative work on other issues detailed in the book.)

Participants are often improvising in supposedly under-control moments.

“In normal situations members and especially senior leaders exude a sense of being on top of events, in control,” Kaiser writes. “This is an act, and often misleading, but rarely exposed.” That improvisation can extend to the staff, too.

During the conference committee on Dodd-Frank, there was “intense” jockeying about the part of the bill that would regulate the financial products known as derivatives. Administration officials negotiated with lawmakers until they thought they had reached a compromise, according to Kaiser.

At one point, then-House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) and then-Assistant Treasury Secretary Michael Barr “had gone outside for a cigarette and a final conversation on the plan,” according to Kaiser. “Peterson was a smoker; the youthful Barr was not, but ‘I smoked several cigarettes,’ he recalled later.”